When Full Throttle was released 25 years ago, it was on top of my wish list. LucasArts had released some of my favorite point and click adventures - the first two Monkey Island games and Day Of The Tentacle - so I was looking forward to playing Full Throttle as well. For some reason, though, I never ended up playing this biker adventure. Until now... after the remastered version of the game landed on my digital doorstep.

For me, the biker theme and Ben, the foul-mouthed protagonist, are the main assets of the game. Add a cool soundtrack to the mix and you're in for what I expected to be an exciting adventure. Unfortunately, about two hours into the game, things started to get annoying. Puzzles that rely heavily on pixel hunting are a no-go in my book. Now, I could turn a blind eye to a handful of pixel hunting puzzles throughout an entire game but these are not the only annoying puzzles. One puzzle in particular, is very time limited. You only get about two or three seconds to inspect the scene and perform a certain action. Once your time is up, an animation kicks in and you have to start over. This gets frustrating very quickly: trying something for two seconds and then having to watch a ten second animation over and over again. This could have been handled differently.

As the story advances, more and more puzzles are replaced by mini games: fighting rival bikers on the road, a demolition derby... When Full Throttle was originally released, point and click adventures were overtaken by first person shooters in popularity. Were the mini games a way of keeping things interesting for players of a genre on the decline? Possibly. And while these mini games themselves are rather fun, they're not what I'm looking for in a point and click adventure. On top of that, the game itself is rather short and the puzzle design really falls short compared to its aforementioned predecessors. Maybe my expectations were set too high, but I was disappointed in Full Throttle. In hindsight, I'm glad I finally got to play it but I would rather have spent my time playing a different adventure game.

When [b]Full Throttle[/b] was released 25 years ago, it was on top of my wish list. LucasArts had released some of my favorite [i]point and click[/i] adventures - the first two [b]Monkey Island[/b] games and [b]Day Of The Tentacle[/b] - so I was looking forward to playing [b]Full Throttle[/b] as well. For some reason, though, I never ended up playing this biker adventure. Until now... after the remastered version of the game landed on my digital doorstep. For me, the biker theme and Ben, the foul-mouthed protagonist, are the main assets of the game. Add a cool soundtrack to the mix and you're in for what I expected to be an exciting adventure. Unfortunately, about two hours into the game, things started to get annoying. Puzzles that rely heavily on [i]pixel hunting[/i] are a no-go in my book. Now, I could turn a blind eye to a handful of pixel hunting puzzles throughout an entire game but these are not the only annoying puzzles. One puzzle in particular, is very time limited. You only get about two or three seconds to inspect the scene and perform a certain action. Once your time is up, an animation kicks in and you have to start over. This gets frustrating very quickly: trying something for two seconds and then having to watch a ten second animation over and over again. This could have been handled differently. As the story advances, more and more puzzles are replaced by mini games: fighting rival bikers on the road, a demolition derby... When [b]Full Throttle[/b] was originally released, [i]point and click[/i] adventures were overtaken by [i]first person shooters[/i] in popularity. Were the mini games a way of keeping things interesting for players of a genre on the decline? Possibly. And while these mini games themselves are rather fun, they're not what I'm looking for in a [i]point and click[/i] adventure. On top of that, the game itself is rather short and the puzzle design really falls short compared to its aforementioned predecessors. Maybe my expectations were set too high, but I was disappointed in [b]Full Throttle[/b]. In hindsight, I'm glad I finally got to play it but I would rather have spent my time playing a different adventure game.